With the increasingly tight financial environment under which virtually all technology departments operate and the daunting need to maintain and grow networks with fewer viable resources, the CTO and other technology leaders need be efficient and effective managers. Without such skills they will be unable to provide timely and useful information necessary to support the primary goal of the educational entity: increased learning. The presenters will offer 10 “lessons learned,” which can assist districts of all sizes in planning and managing their networks. With more than 50 years of experience in implementing and managing networks and distributed applications in a variety of environments, the presenters’ lessons learned are useful to CTOs and other technology leaders in districts of all sizes. Furthermore, these 10 lessons learned will be directly linked to CoSN’s Framework of Essential Skills of the K-12 CTO.